Assange interviewed by Venezuelan TV station teleSUR

London
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Venezuelan TV station teleSUR interviewed Julian Assange at London’s Ecuadorian Embassy. During the interview, allegations by Sweden, the grant of Ecuadorian asylum and WikiLeaks were discussed.

The video above is a brief extract from the full interview. The full interview (Spanish language) can be viewed with transcript in Spanish here. To confirm the validity of this article, the Spanish text can be translated to English, using the Bing translator.

Please note further that Assange spoke English during the interview, which was translated to Spanish, and is now translated back to English, so the text is not "word for word" but the meaning has been retained.

Assange is currently holed up in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, and whilst Ecuador has granted him diplomatic asylum on the grounds of political persecution, he is unable to leave, as the U.K. will not grant him safe passage out of the country. The U.K. government seeks to extradite him to Sweden to face questioning in an alleged sexual assault case. U.K. officials have vowed to arrest him should he step outside the embassy building.

On the alleged charges leveled by Sweden and when he will be able to leave the embassy, Assange said, "I think the situation will be solved with diplomacy, or through an unusual world occurrence that we can't predict, such as war with Iran, the U.S. election or the Swedish government dropping the case. I think this is the most likely scenario."

"Maybe after a thorough investigation they could drop the case. I think this will be solved in between six and twelve months."

During the interview Assange says that the U.S. government wishes not only his capture and conviction on espionage charges, but also to stop WikiLeaks, the organization founded by him, which has revealed secret and confidential documents that unmask (and embarrass) the U.S.

"They say it explicitly, in special documents: not only accusing Julian Assange of espionage, but also to curb the current activities of WikiLeaks".

Assange denounced the false accusations by senior officials and American "political actors", who manipulate the information and issues, without evidence. He says the statement made by Sarah Palin, denouncing "Assange is an anti-American operator with blood on his hands," as an outright lie.

"When you type into Google "blood on the hands" and "WikiLeaks", there are 700 thousand results. But if you write "blood on the hands" and "Pentagon", there are only 70 thousand results. In between this, is the media saying that WikiLeaks has killed more people than all the wars in which the U.S. has participated?"

Assange asserts that despite persecution launched against him and WikiLeaks, including banking blocks and arrests, "we have not been defeated".

He reiterated that he and his organization will continue to fight to prevent the installation of "an international system of arbitrary laws", implemented by "interconnected complex groups" pushing societies into a "transnational totalitarian state."

He also explained that WikiLeaks is just the name of the publication, but behind this name, there are many more organizations. "We work as a blog type of organization, we need to collect information and defend ourselves legally, economically and politically."

"We are campaigning for the rights of the sources, the rights of journalists. The word "journalist" has never had so much power as it has now," he argued.

With respect to the material published, Assange reaffirmed that "WikiLeaks will always publish the truth, like a classic news service."

Discussing the ongoing work of WikiLeaks, Assange said, "WikiLeaks is in the process of publishing 2.4 million emails from the Syrian government. We have an inside perspective. It's obvious that the western powers are using the Syrian issue in order to get rid of Syria's political opposition to the role of Israel, to weaken Iran."

When asked about the support of the people and countries of Latin America and the Caribbean, Assange said that he was grateful for so much solidarity.

"It was a pleasant surprise, all in Latin America came out to support us ... it could not have happened ten years ago. This reflects a strengthening of the integration of Latin America," he said.

Similarly, Assange rejected the criticism that he is being used by Ecuador as a political tool.

"I don't feel used in any way," he said.

He added that Ecuador had reviewed all the evidence he presented and the administration of President Rafael Correa concluded its investigation, giving the reason: "the political persecution of Assange exists."

"If you look at the broader concept, Ecuador has been right to demonstrate their values, not only in granting me asylum, because it has the economic capacity to do so, but also to go a little further than expected. I feel that they (Ecuador) really possess human values," he said.